Learning to trust myself has allowed me to be happy in my body in a way I never imagined possible. But it required that I stop judging my happiness by looking in the mirror and comparing my body to other women's bodies. It required that I look inside, listen to and trust my body, and find happiness by turning away from appearance and toward my heart.

The mind is afraid that if you love the body as it is, you will no longer listen to it -- you'll no longer listen to reason. But the not so secret truth that the mind likes to conveniently forget is that it's not separate from the body.

The legacy that remains is having to monitor my thinking. Occasionally my choices. Automatic calorie counts registering in my head. Picking toppings off of pizza. 'I don't like crust', I explain. (That's a bunch of hooey).

The amazing thing about the human body is this: Just because you choose to ignore the warnings signs don't mean they will go away. One way or another, if your body needs food, needs rest, it will force you to shut down. And that's exactly what happened to me.

The notion that cosmetic surgery is a "simple beauty treatment" is a contradiction in terms, a paradox of sorts. Surgery is almost never simple, physically or psychologically, and the more we believe it's a solution to our beauty needs, the less beautiful we tend to feel.

I'd take that old snapshot out from the back of my mind and dust it off a little before peering closer. You were beautiful. You were behind the wheel I'd say to the photograph, before putting it back with a few others I'd saved.

If we keep accepting this as reality, if we keep dieting and trying to fit into the stereotypes, or if we keep apologizing for not fitting into the stereotypes, we're doomed. No matter who you are, it's almost impossible to be "pretty" and "thin" to everyone. You will always be "fat" or "ugly" to someone.

I can tell my daughter that nothing is as beautiful as her little body exactly as it is no matter if she is tall, short, big or small. But I am sure she sees through my platitudes. Because she sees a mom who is always on a diet. She sees a mom who looks in the mirror and sighs.

I still have the tough days where the diet industry gets its hooks in me. I still feel a little guilty every time I rip open a little packet of fake sugar. But most days I feel proud of how far I've come. I relish food for the experience it brings, for the sustenance it gives me.

A person's "realness" does not necessarily increase with his or her number of curves, and similarly their power and worth do not increase with degree of thinness. Realness comes from being comfortable in one's own skin and creating a life worth living.